Free Republic

The United Nations Relief and Works Agency has terminated the contracts of 12 employees over their alleged involvement in the Oct. 7 Hamas terror attacks in Israel and launched an investigation into their role. Philippe Lazzarini, UNRWA Commissioner-General, made the announcement after the U.S., Canada and Australia paused additional funding for UNRWA pending the investigation’s outcome.In a statement Friday, Lazzarini emphasized that any UNRWA employee involved in acts of terror would face criminal prosecution. “UNRWA reiterates its condemnation in the strongest possible terms of the abhorrent attacks of 7 October and calls for the immediate and unconditional release of all...

Former MK Michael Oren: Delegation is part of Democrats fight for the "soul of the party.” The 41 US House Democrats who arrived in Israel on Monday on a trip sponsored by an AIPAC affiliated charity are doing more than “just” showing mainstream Democratic support for Israel, they are wresting control of the party from the high-profile Progressive wing trying to hijack it. A part of this wing – embodied by congresswomen Ilhan Omar, Rashida Tlaib and Alexandira Ocasio-Cortez – despises Israel and AIPAC with a venom that sometimes crosses the line into antisemitism. And two organizations identified with this...

The White House is reportedly planning to accept Israeli demands for increased military aid, following pressure by the US Senate to sign a new Memorandum of Understanding laying out US support to Israel for the next decade. With the current Memorandum of Understanding set to expire in 2018, Israel has been pressuring the White House to enlarge the annual aid package from $3.1 billion to between $4-4.5 billion. Israel has stated that it must increase its military spending to cope with growing threats from ISIS and the Iranian regime following last year’s nuclear deal. …

WASHINGTON – Congress seeks to stop an influx of unaccompanied children from Latin American countries as thousands continue to stream across the southern border – and wants enforcement to start with an “unambiguous message” from the Obama administration. The House held three hearings last week on the crisis as federal officials struggle to slow the tide of young immigrants crossing the border. More than 52,000 minors traveling without their parents have been caught crossing the southwest border illegally since October, including 9,000 in May alone. More than 250 children are being apprehended every day along the southern border. Nearly two-thirds...

New York Times reporter James Risen called the Obama administration “the greatest enemy of press freedom that we have encountered in at least a generation” on Friday, explaining that the White House seeks to control the flow of information and those that refuse to play along “will be punished.” Poynter reports that Risen made the remarks while speaking at Sources and Secrets conference — a meeting of journalism and communication professionals held in New York City. The foreign policy reporter, who is currently fighting a fierce court battle with the federal government over his protection of a confidential source, warned...

Schumer at AIPAC 2014NY Senator Charles Schumer railed Monday against the Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions movement, saying that the movement is a modern form of anti-Semitism. “It is very suspicious that those who boycott Israel don’t want to boycott anywhere else in the world,” Sen. Schumer told AIPAC. “I believe that those who call for boycotts of Israel without calling for boycotts of other neighboring nations are practicing, whether they know it or not, whether they admit it or not, a modern form of what we call anti-Semitism.” “The word that describes all of these acts is a very simple one:...

President Barack Obama said Monday that he will "absolutely" hold off on striking Syria if President Bashar Assad puts his chemical weapons arsenals under international control in line with a Russia-backed proposal. In a series of six television interviews, Obama also said he was not "confident" of getting congressional authorization to use force and had not decided whether to go ahead with attacking Syria if he doesn't. But he warned that "the U.S. does not do pinpricks."

The immigration legislation moving quickly toward a full Senate vote triggered a stand-off Thursday between competing wings of the Republican Party, as conservative members accused their colleagues of greasing the wheels for passage with a "fig leaf" that only claims to address border security.

WASHINGTON, D.C., June 19, 2013 (LifeSiteNews.com) – Although religious rhetoric is usually associated with the pro-life movement, one Democrat sounded like a hellfire and brimstone preacher while defending late-term abortion on the floor of the House of Representatives on Tuesday. “This bill is an abomination!” said Rep. Gwen Moore, D-WI. “Plain and simple, at its foundation, at its heart, is utter disrespect for the dignity and health of women.” Arizona Congressman Trent Franks introduced the “Pain-Capable Unborn Child Protection Act” (H.R. 1797) to prevent atrocities like those committed by Kermit Gosnell and Douglas Karpen, who are accused (and in the...

NSA Claims Broad Authority to Monitor Americans' International Calls and Emails Agency Retains Purely Domestic Communications Without Warrants, Documents Show

DENVER (AP) - Qatar's U.S. ambassador rushed to the defense of his envoy whom authorities say grabbed a surreptitious smoke in a jetliner's bathroom, sparking a bomb scare and widespread alert that sent jet fighters scrambling to intercept the Denver-bound flight. But no explosives were found and authorities speaking on condition of anonymity said they don't think he was trying to hurt anyone during Wednesday's scare and he will not be criminally charged. Qatar's U.S. ambassador, Ali Bin Fahad Al-Hajri, cautioned against a rush to judgment. "This diplomat was traveling to Denver on official embassy business on my instructions, and...

Lawyers for Sarah Palin webmail hack suspect David Kernell claim his PC was infected with spyware. The contention may be used at trial to support arguments that the 21-year-old student son of a Tennessee Democrat politician was not personally responsible for the hack on a Yahoo! account maintained by the former Alaskan governor, which was traced back to an IP address used by Kernell. The content of emails and family photos were uploaded onto 4Chan during last year's presidential election campaign. The webmail account was compromised after hackers reset Palin's password using biographical info that was far from hard to...

Video of Major Garrett who asked the WH if Van Jones filled out the WH Questionnaire. He did not. http://www.breitbart.tv/white-house-van-jones-did-not-fill-out-63-question-seven-page-questionnaire/

BAGHDAD, Iraq - Gen. George W. Casey Jr., the top commander in Iraq, voiced confidence Saturday that the United States would not abandon its mission in this violence-racked country amid a post-election re-evaluation of Iraq strategy. "The weeks and months ahead will require courage and determination," Casey said at a Veterans Day naturalization ceremony for 75 U.S. troops at Baghdad's Camp Victory. "But succeed we will." His comments were among his first public statements since the resignation of Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld last week. Washington political insiders have speculated that Casey and U.S. Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad, who was also...

ATLANTA -- A judge has struck down Georgia's ban on same-sex marriages, saying a measure overwhelmingly approved by voters in 2004 violated a provision of the state constitution that limits ballot questions to a single subject. The ruling by Fulton County Superior Court Judge Constance C. Russell had been eagerly awaited by gay-rights supporters who filed the court challenge in November 2004, soon after the constitutional ban was approved. Russell said the state's voters must first decide whether same-sex relationships should have any legal status before they can be asked to decide whether same-sex marriages should be banned. "People who...

A community college math instructor has apologized for a test question invoking Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice that students complained was racially insensitive. Peter Ratener, 60, who has taught at Bellevue Community College for more than 25 years, said Wednesday night at a trustees meeting that the question on an exam last month was an "egregious mistake." It began, "Condoleezza holds a watermelon just over the edge of the roof of the 300-foot Federal Building, and tosses it up with a velocity of 20 feet per second." The question then asked students to determine when the watermelon would hit the...

German Protestant youth group creates calendar with photos depicting erotic scenes from Bible. It's wonderful when teenagers commit themselves with hair and skin to Bible, pastor says A German Protestant youth group has put together a 2006 calendar with 12 staged photos depicting erotic scenes from the Bible, including a bare-breasted Delilah cutting Samson's hair and a nude Eve offering an apple. "There's a whole range of biblical scriptures simply bursting with eroticism," said Stefan Wiest, the 32-year-old photographer who took the titillating pictures. Anne Rohmer, 21, poses on a doorstep in garters and stockings as the prostitute Rahab, who...

WASHINGTON (AFP) - US Democratic presidential candidate John Kerry (news - web sites) plans to focus on US security while de-emphasizing promotion of democracy in dealings with countries like Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, China and Russia, if he is elected president. "How fast you can do that and how rapidly others can embrace it and what can be expected over a period of time varies from place to place," Kerry told the Washington Post newspaper in an interview. "Beware of the presidential candidate who just sort of says with a big paintbrush we're going to make everything all right overnight,"...

Archives Write to Mr. Ayaz Amir Some liberation By Ayaz Amir In victory's wake comes a bandwagon effect, gilding the arms of the winners and tarnishing the cause of the losers. Bystanders not wishing to be seen on the wrong side of the argument are tempted to climb this bandwagon. They try to convince themselves that they always knew events would turn out like this. This is happening now in Iraq. The entry of American troops into Baghdad and the collapse of the Saddam regime are drowning questions about the nature of this war, the purposes behind it and...